poeticsandaliens

[poeticsandaliens]

Aight so I keep seeing these discussions about what the Arcane creators did and didn't say and whether that means Jayce and Viktor are canon platonic or romantic or some secret third thing and I would like to make a case for ignoring irrelevant things that writers say in an attempt to clarify their creation. And I say these words as a writer who peppers my AO3 shit with random endnotes commenting on my creations, which you can feel free to throw in the trash.

I'm not arguing that we should all just clamp down our ears and go lalalala, nor am I arguing for full-on Death of the Author. I just think if a storyteller has to clarify a textual detail in an interview or on Twitter (looking at you Joanne) then it doesn't actually matter. Because if the creator CARES that much about how we as an audience interpret that detail they should put it into the fucking text. If it matters that much to the text it should be in the text. And if it's not in the text then it doesn't really matter and I'll go on interpreting. This especially goes for taxonomizing murky relationships. We often desire taxonomy, but ambiguity can say compelling things about the way we navigate human connection.

Like there're shades of gray to this, but specifically, I'm arguing that the creator of the show actually gets no bearing on whether you read Jayce and Viktor as erotic or platonic or whatever. Because they chose to tell a story about the power of love and part of the power of that archetype is its slipperiness. Love to the point of literal cosmic singularity. Soul-bonding shit. It doesn't matter to the text whether they're having filthy lab sex in our imaginations.

Normally I wouldn't write a little thesis about it, but this case reminds me of Achilles and Patroclus. Classicists will argue forever about whether or not they were fucking, and we'll get into historical context, and Athenian traditions that post-date them, and so on. And it's a fun conversation but it's also deeply not the point. I read Achilles and Patroclus as a complicated slippery relationship where war and love and lust get their wires crossed and you've known someone so deeply for so long you can't HELP but cling to them body and soul. But what's so interesting is that clinging body and soul can be any combination of sexual/erotic/platonic/worship/etc. I read them quite erotically but what matters to me in the end isn't whether they're fucking it's how wholly and wildly they loved each other. What matters isn't the taxonomy; it's that when Patroclus died, Achilles dragged Hector's mangled corpse behind his chariot in a fit of grief and feral rage.

Anyway I feel very normal about this.

[poeticsandaliens]

Apparently, if I scroll too deep into jayce x viktor content on Instagram the algorithm delivers me back to wolfstar. This must be how it feels to get lost in the woods, pass a peculiar tree and realize you've been walking in circles.

[poeticsandaliens]

expect me not to be beside myself over Viktor when my twelve-year-old self reading pjo cried for fucking Daedalus

[poeticsandaliens]

What I really need is a clip comp of Viktor and Silco set to those famous lines from Hamlet-

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, the oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, the pangs of dispriz'd love, the law's delay, the insolence of office.... but that the dread of something after death, the undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveller returns, puzzles the will?

[poeticsandaliens]

I don't smoke, I rarely drink, I've never touched a hard drug in my life but one little cold and see how I fast I become the Walter fucking White of antihistamines

[poeticsandaliens]

Like you can't tell me the Archivist and Viktor are not cut from the same archetypal cloth. Arcane S2 gives me such "cut the tether" energy

[poeticsandaliens]

I'm convinced that Viktor the Machine Herald, Remus Lupin, and Jonathan Sims are all the same archetype and that archetype gives me such concerning gender envy.

[poeticsandaliens]

all of my favorite women live in the same place and that place is the fridge

[poeticsandaliens]

*RARE* John Denver & Johnny Cash - Take Me Home Country Roads

Found this while going through my granddad’s VHS tapes and couldn’t find it anywhere online, so here it is.

[poeticsandaliens]

"Please, save what remains of us."

With all kindness, put yourself in my family's place—what would you do?

Hello Dear,

I write to you overwhelmed with pain and helplessness 😔. My name is Abdelsalam, and I carry a burden too heavy to bear. My little daughter Amoona 👧 is living in unimaginable conditions. Every day is a battle for survival, where even her most basic rights—safety 🛡️, medicine 💊, and food 🍞—are distant dreams.

Amoona doesn't know the taste of childhood. She is growing up in a world that shows no mercy 💔, and as a father, I feel helpless watching her grow without being able to protect her. You have a voice that reaches millions 🎤, and your influence can be the difference between life and death.

I kindly ask, not just as a father but as a human 🙏, if you could consider offering some financial support, no matter how small, to help us provide the essentials Amoona needs. Your generosity could change our lives and bring hope back to my daughter’s future.

Additionally, I beg you to help spread my campaign. Let my voice reach the world 🌍, let people know what we are going through. All I ask is for a few words from you, but those words, alongside your support, could save Amoona and give her the life she deserves 💫.

Every word, every share, and every bit of help could be a lifeline ⛑️.

With the deepest gratitude,

Abdelsalam

Boosting this from my inbox to send more people to his profile

[poeticsandaliens]

I was gonna suggest that the man in fisherman's garb luring people absently to the lock museum could BE Martin...

Make the choice, the museum implores. You're both going to die, or you have to make the sacrifice.

A version of Martin that appears not unlike old Peter Lukas, just less talkative and more auietly solemn, as if he knows what will happen when they enter and maybe regrets it but doesn't try to stop them.

So maybe it's just me but I'm kind of getting the feeling that the situation w Jon is something like this

... Which makes the implications of him suddenly and without prompting pulling a case about inadvertently causing the death of a lover and dealing with the guilt thereafter, desperately searching for a way to fix the situation one way or another . deeply troubling to say the least

[poeticsandaliens]

vampirism poses the question "what if there was a fundamental, horrible, unending well of want in your soul that, if truly satisfied, would lead to great pain for all those you hold closest and, in turn, their absolute and total revilement of you?" and naturally as a person with no problems I don't relate to this in any way at all.

[poeticsandaliens]

Where are his eyes?

Exactly where they’ve always been, Martin. Watching over my Institute.

[poeticsandaliens]

I need a TMA Pacific Rim AU immediately. Like... I don't care if it's antithetical to the entire point of eldritch horror, I don't care what the ships are I don't care who's piloting a giant robot and who's drifting with a Kaiju I just would get a lot of joy out of this and would maybe sell my soul to see it.

[poeticsandaliens]

there isn't a barber in prison

[poeticsandaliens]

like I'm sorry is "I am the throat of delusion incarnate" NOT one of the most erotic lines to come out of the entire show?

[poeticsandaliens]

The TMA fans writing Michael Distortion smut are doing God's work. I love a good hot vampire, but if the monster is already that generically hot, there's no challenge. Let him build his own anatomy. MAKE me love him. Show me the tenderness beneath the skin of eldritch evil.